The Best South Park Episodes
The 8th season of South Park came out on DVD yesterday and I thought I’d list my favorite episodes from the last 8 seasons.
Season 1:
107 – PINK EYE
This episode remains one of my favorites because it was the first episode I saw. A long time ago, the Boulder Theater had an entire night where they played some guy’s tape of South Park episodes. When I got there, they were in the middle of another episode, and Pink Eye was the first one I saw from the beginning. I loved the “Thriller” reference with Chef and I was instantly captivated by Cartman. This episode was my first glimpse at the genius of Matt and Trey and I was hooked!
Season 2:
201 – TERRANCE AND PHILIP IN NOT WITHOUT MY ANUS
While most people hated this episode and wanted to kick Matt and Trey’s asses when it aired, you have to admit, it was pretty brilliant. I love the concept of a cliffhanger that never pays off and I love the idea of an all Terrance and Philip episode even more. This was also great for it’s early glimpse at Sadaam, who would play a huge role in the movie. On top of that, I love Ugly Bob and Scott.
203 – CHICKENLOVER
This episode simply has to make the list because who doesn’t love Cartman with “authoritah”? The parody of COPS was spot on and, even though the Officer Barbrady plot line wasn’t thrilling, Cartman was enough to carry the show.
Season 3:
307 – CAT ORGY
In my favorite installment of the meteor shower trilogy, Cartman and Shelley waged war. The Wild Wild West song Cartman sings is perfect because it captures everything that was stupid about that awful movie, including the “big metal spider”. If that wasn’t awesome enough, this episode also introduced us to Skyler, who would later be in Timmy’s band, The Lords of the Underworld.
310 – CHINPOKOMON
Who could possibly capture the Pokemon craze better than Matt and Trey? The combination of South Park style animation and anime was brilliant and I loved the different Chinpokomon characters. My favorite was Shoe.
315 – MR. HANKEY’S CHRISTMAS CLASSICS
Season three was a juggernaut, one of the best ever, but it was also marked by the death of Mary Kay Bergman, the original voice of all the female characters. This episode aired right after her death and had a sweet sentimentality during the last song that you don’t often see in South Park. The music in the episode was funny, but also really good. In particular, the dreidel song, featuring lines like “Jews play stupid games.” and “Courtney Cox, I love you. You’re so hot on that show.” was expertly arranged and performed. I have the CD of “Mr. Hankey’s Christmas Classics” and I love it.
Season 4:
406 – CARTMAN JOINS NAMBLA
In Cartman’s quest to be cooler and more mature than all his friends, he stumbled upon a group that sought to unite young boys with older men… little did he know, it was NAMBLA. I love this episode because it perfectly captures what Cartman is all about, being better than everyone else, even if it means hanging out with child molesters.
409 – SOMETHING YOU CAN DO WITH YOUR FINGER
Season 4 was all about Cartman trying to get $10 million. Creating a boy band called Fingerbang, was one of his earliest ideas. This episode was awesome because of the entire backstory with Randy being in a boy band and being exploited. I love the sequence when he loses his job, his house, his car, and his chicks, “theee ya!”
410 – DO THE HANDICAPPED GO TO HELL?
411 – PROBABLY
Because this was a two part episode, I’m listing both together. Cartman’s evangelical preaching was hilarious. When we finally found out that it was all part of a plot to get $10 million, it was even better. It might as well have been a documentary about those televangelists in the south. The best part of the series was the relationship drama going on just outside the lake of fire. Satan was in a relationship with Chris, a genuinely good guy, when Sadaam came back into his life. Satan was shocked to see Sadaam again in hell, but where was he gonna go, Detroit? The Satan/Sadaam story line was like a little epilogue for the movie and it was great to see where Matt and Trey were going to take those characters.
413 – TRAPPER KEEPER
It’s so hard to pick my favorites from season 4. I wanted to list 412 “Fourth Grade” because of the Star Wars references, but I opted for this episode because it was one of the first political allegories they ever did. The kindergarten election scandal was perfect for showing just how stupid the 2000 election really was. Most of all though, I loved that Cartman had a super awesome Trapper Keeper and that he kept trying to make Kyle jealous. The best scene: Cartman warns Kyle that his Trapper Keeper is coded to his own fingers, so if anyone tries to steal it, big metal spikes come out that pierce the hands. Kyle doesn’t believe him so Cartman says, “well then why don’t you hold it? If it doesn’t have metal spikes, then hold it.”
416 – THE WACKY MOLESTATION ADVENTURE
This episode is great because it starts out simple, about the boys being mad at their parents, and ends with a weird post-apocalyptic town that is run by feuding child gangs. I have to believe that, if you really did let kids run the world, we’d descend into total chaos and start human sacrifices. I love the sequence when Stan is explaining the story of “the before time” to the outsiders and the scenes in the prison rehabilitation center when the parents are told to “just look at this young boy, don’t molest him.”
417 – A VERY CRAPPY CHRISTMAS
Last one from season 4, I swear! This episode is awesome because of it’s self-reflexivity. I love “The Spirit of Christmas”, the short that started it all for Trey and Matt, and it was great that some small part of that actually aired on the show. Also great in this episode was Mr. Hankey’s drunken wife, Autumn. “You boys wanna bet me I won’t take of my clothes?”
Season 5:
501 – SCOTT TENORMAN MUST DIE
At the time, this was probably the most twisted episode of South Park ever. It really took Cartman to a new level. When Scott Tenorman outwits Cartman into giving him $16.12, Cartman seeks revenge by masterminding an elaborate plan to kill Scott’s parents and feed their ground up bodies to him at a Chile Con Carnival. The last scene when Scott sobs at the table and Cartman licks up his tears saying “let me taste your tears, Scott” is so infinitely wrong on so many levels. I love the references to Hanibal, except this time it’s training an animal to bite off someone’s weiner. To this day, whenever someone outwits me and I want to feed them their own parents, I think about Scot Tenorman.
502 – IT HITS THE FAN
“Tonight, on Cop Drama, they’re gonna say… shit.” So begins the most profanity-laced episode ever. There were 162 “shits” in all in this hilarious episode. It wasn’t just the cursing that was fun about this show, I also loved hearing “Cop Drama” as everyone sat around watching it. There’s a certain voice that Trey and Matt do, I call it the Cop Drama voice, that perfectly captures all that is stupid about over-dramatic acting. They also do it in Team America quite a bit and I couldn’t think it was funnier.
506 – CARTMANLAND
In another episode that perfectly captured all that is Cartman, Cartman buys an amusement park solely to exclude other people from being able to go. To his horror, he needs to sell a few tickets to keep the park running and, before long, Cartmanland just like any Six Flags with kids running around everywhere and all the lines, lines, lines, lines! I love the Dr. Seus reference and I love that Cartman’s happiness gives Kyle a hemorrhoid and makes him lose his will to live.
508 – TOWELIE
If Matt and Trey set out to create the dumbest character ever, they’re damn well gonna do it! Towelie was just so weird and random that I was thoroughly entertained. The best part of this episode was that the boys had no interest in the intergalactic conspiracy unfolding around them and were only concerned about playing with their Game Sphere.
514 – BUTTERS’ VERY OWN EPISODE
I guess season 5 was the era of disturbing moments because this episode even topped “Scott Tenorman” for the title of most messed up thing they’ve ever done. When the happy-go-lucky Butters reveals to his mom that his father has been frequenting gay porn theaters and bathhouses, she goes crazy and decides to drown Butters in the car before killing herself. Instead, she and her husband reconcile and claim that Butters was kidnapped by “some Puerto Rican guy.” It is beyond twisted and utterly hilarious. I especially love the scene at the end where they flash on the faces of OJ Simpson, Gary Condit, and John and Patsy Ramsey as Butters dad yells “You liar! You murdering murderer!”
Season 6:
603 – ASSPEN
Both plot lines in this episode, the parents being trapped and forced into buying a timeshare and the boys dealing with the teen movie ski competition, are priceless. I love the way that Tad, the hot shot skier who challenges Stan, shows up out of nowhere or the way that they have the final race on The K13, the most dangerous run in America. My friends and I went for weeks calling each other “Stan Darsh” after this. Everything about this episode is like watching a teen movie of the 80s… except for the Total Recall part at the end.
607 – THE SIMPSONS ALREADY DID IT
Have you ever had a really great idea, only to find out that someone else had that same idea years before you? That’s exactly what happens to Butters, here as Prof. Chaos, as he plots to bring destruction and doom to the town. Every scheme he and Gen. Disarray plot has already been executed on The Simpsons. This show proves that you can improve on perfection as they take The Simpsons’ story line about growing a tiny society and give it the South Park touch adding five gallons of semen and one dead teacher.
609 – FREE HAT
Forget the plot about the townspeople rallying to free a convicted baby killer, the meat of this episode was in the Star Wars/Raiders of the Lost Ark story line with George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. It’s also amazing because it garnered a very polite f-you letter from Spielberg himself.
613 – THE RETURN OF THE LORD OF THE RINGS TO THE TWO TOWERS
I don’t even need to go into detail about how awesome this episode was. Not only did they do an amazing parody of LOTR, there was also a creepy sex scene with Stan’s parents and, of course, the most vile and dirty porno ever made, Back Door Sluts 9. I loved the shot for shot recreations of some of the best LOTR scenes, including the elf council and the scene when the hobbits hide under the tree.
Season 7:
703 – TOILET PAPER
This episode came in a long line of crime-solving episodes which I call The Cop Drama Collection. First was “Chickenlover” then came this one and next was “Lil’ Crime Stoppers” with a few crime related episodes in the middle somewhere. This was a great episode even if you only look at the scene where Cartman is killing Kyle with a wiffle bat on the pond as Godfather-like music plays in the background. It reminds me of the 1940s classic noir film Double Indemnity, except about TP-ing a house instead of murder.
704 – CANCELLED
There are two scenes that lead me to add this episode to the list. The first is the scene with Jeff Goldblum trying to figure out the alien code on a train of thought that takes us from butt sex to the Chupacabra before finally arriving at the realization that the Earth reality show has been cancelled. The second awesome scene is when the two galactic network execs get a hooker and some cocaine and end up giving each other alien blowjobs. Self-reflexive episodes are my favorite and this managed to take a whole new look at the first episode.
705 – FAT BUTT AND PANCAKE HEAD
Aside from all the great jokes about Jennifer Lopez, this episode also features Cartman jacking off Ben Affleck. How Comedy Central didn’t make them cut that is beyond me. Still, my favorite scene is the ending where Ms. Jennifer Lopez (Cartman’s hand) reveals herself to be Mitch Conner, an ex-con who’s “just tired of running” before jumping off a bridge to his death. It’s great because it’s like this whole other B plot that just shows up out of nowhere.
706 – LIL’ CRIME STOPPERS
Another amazing addition to the Cop Drama Collection, this episode featured the boys starting their own detective service. They got so good that they were made Jr. Detectives by the police. They bust a meth lab and expose a crime ring that involves two crooked cops… all this while clashing with the cliche police captain who reprimands them for their “shoot first ask questions later” methods. It’s a perfect parody of so many cop movies and TV shows.
708 – SOUTH PARK IS GAY
Aside from making fun of the metrosexual trend and ripping on Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, this episode is legendary because it was the first time we saw crab people. Trey and Matt simply could not think of a third act for the show and opted to go with it all just being a plot by crab people to take over the earth. Now, every time they can’t think of an ending, they reference crab people. It has become synonymous with being completely out of ideas.
711 – CASA BONITA
While people who don’t know about Casa Bonita might not find this episode that funny, anyone who grew up around Denver will love it. I can remember when I was in school, every year we were promised a Spanish class trip to Casa Bonita and every year something would fall through at the last minute and we couldn’t go. I finally got to go there a few months ago and it was just as cool as they said. I think I’d probably do exactly what Cartman did and risk being thrown in jail just to run through Casa Bonita for five minutes.
714 – RAISINS
This episode introduced us to some of my favorite new characters, the goth kids. What could be better than a bunch of suburban kids sitting around writing poems about pain? I love the way they called out goth kids for claiming they’re not complete stereotypes while preaching that “the only way to be a nonconformist is to drink coffee and smoke cigarettes and listen to the same kind of music we do.”
Season 8:
801 – GOOD TIMES WITH WEAPONS
In another anime-inspired episode, the boys purchase weapons from the far east and decide they are ninjas. They get carried away and Kenny ends up chucking a throwing star into Butters’ eye. The ninja sequences are so great that I nearly forgot about the Janet Jackson nipple slip reference.
805 – YOU GOT F’ED IN THE A (OR YOU GUT F*CKED IN THE ASS)
Everyone can admit that You Got Served is stupid, so making fun of it here was great. While I liked Butters’ dark past about the tap dance massacre, my favorite part was the “You do a line and I’ll do a line” song that the duck danced to.
807 – THE JEFFERSONS
Everyone who knows me knows that I’m a Michael Jackson fan, but that didn’t stop me from laughing by ass of at this episode. What I loved most was that Matt and Trey came up with some original jokes about MJ. Yeah, they made fun of his plastic surgery, but rather than just scream that he was a child molester, they attacked Jacko’s parenting, saying that you can’t keep trying to recreate your childhood once you have a child yourself.
809 – SOMETHING WALL-MART THIS WAY COMES
Instead of making a big political issue out of globalization, Trey and Matt made a Matrix-style haunted house out of Wal-Mart and showed it as an entity all its own. My favorite part is Randy pressing his body against the window as he stares at the store down the road, unable to control his desire of it’s great bargains.
There are a lot of great episodes that I didn’t put on the list, but only because the list was getting way, way too long. These are just some of the ones I’ve seen a zillion times or the ones I quote all the time. What are your favorite episodes?
